Mr. Margoliouth thinks that the “teacher of righteousness” to whom the sect attributed its institutions and laws was Jesus. The statement of this conjecture is its refutation. The rôle of a legislator is the last which the character and teaching of Jesus in the Gospels would suggest even to a sect in search of a founder. That he, whose disregard for the Pharisaic rules of Sabbath observance repeatedly got him into trouble, should, within a generation after his death, have been metamorphosed into the author of the sabbatical code in our texts, which out-pharisees the Pharisees at every point, surpasses ordinary powers of imagination. The Christian Jews of the first century in Palestine, so far as we know anything about them, conformed in the matter of observance to the authority of the scribes and Pharisees, and alleged the express command of Jesus for this practice (Matt. 23 2). Early Christian heresies sometimes exhibit ascetic features reminding us of the Essenes; but none of ultra-legalistic tendency is known.
As our sect is very zealous for things which have no connection with Christianity, so on the other hand the texts disclose no trace of specific Christian beliefs or conceptions. For the Christian Jews of the first century, the belief that Jesus, who had been crucified under Pontius Pilate, was the Messiah of prophecy, that he had risen from the dead and ascended to heaven, whence he was presently to come in might and majesty, according to the vision of Daniel, to usher in the new era, was the pith and substance of their faith, the “heresy” by which they were separated from their countrymen, the focus of their polemic and [pg 375] apologetic in controversies with those who rejected their Messiah. It is impossible to imagine a writing as long as this, and imbued as strongly as this with a controversial spirit, proceeding from any Christian sect, in which there should not be so much as an allusion to any of these things; or that a sect which put John the Baptist in so high a place should not make something of baptism in the admission of members.
Apart from these general considerations, Mr. Margoliouth's identifications rest upon a palpable misinterpretation. On page 1 we read: “But because God remembered the covenant with the forefathers, he left Israel a remnant, and did not suffer them to be exterminated. And at the end of wrath ... he visited them and caused to spring up from Israel and Aaron a root of his planting to inherit his land and to prosper on the good things of his earth.” The italicized clauses prove beyond question that the “root” is not an individual, but is a collective designation for the first generation of the sect.[106] The parallel passage on p. 5 says explicitly: “God remembered the covenant with the forefathers, and he raised up from Aaron men of insight and from Israel wise men, and he heard them, and they dug the well.” “The well is the law, and they who dug it are the exiles of Israel who migrated to Judah and sojourned in the land of Damascus.” In the face of this perfectly plain meaning of the passage Mr. Margoliouth takes “the root” for the person designated in other places as “the Anointed from Aaron and Israel,” who led the people “to recognize their wickedness and know that they were guilty men.”[107] In this first Messiah he recognizes John the Baptist, and, consequently, in the Teacher of Righteousness who came after him, Jesus. The point of correspondence is the relation between the forerunner and his successor. The text, however, as I have just showed, says nothing of a precursor of the teacher of righteousness; on the contrary, it was this teacher who first brought light to the generation which in the consciousness of its sin was [pg 376] groping like the blind, and guided them in the way of God's heart.[108]
That by the “man of scoffing” the Apostle Paul is meant is for Mr. Margoliouth a corollary of the preceding identifications, and falls with them. The enemies of Paul were doubtless capable of calling him all sorts of hard names, but there is nothing in the epithets “scorner” and “liar,” or in the doings attributed to this figure, which fits Paul better than any other false teacher and sower of discord, while the reference to the fate of the men of war who followed the “man of lies” seems quite inapplicable to Paul.[109]
That we should be unable to identify the Covenanters of Damascus with any sect previously known is not surprising. The three or four centuries in the middle of which the Christian era falls were prolific in sects and heresies of many complexions, as were the centuries following the rise of Islam. Through Philo, Josephus, the church Fathers, and the Talmud, we are acquainted with some of them; but it is probable that there were many others of which no reports have reached us. If we cannot, out of the collection at our disposal, put a label on our Covenanters, we may console ourselves with the reflection that here we know one Jewish sect from its own monuments, and that the texts in our hands, mutilated as they are, suffice to give us a much clearer notion of its peculiarities than we get of most of the other sects from the descriptions which have come down to us.
Its affinities with various antipharisaic or antirabbinical parties, such as the Samaritans, the Sadducees, and, in later times, the Karaites, is obvious. It shared with all these a zeal for the letter and the literal interpretation, and a disposition to extend the law by analogy of principle, as a result of which their rules were in general much stricter than those of the Rabbis, who possessed [pg 377] in the theory of tradition and in their methods of exegesis the means of adapting the law to changed conditions, and who were also more disposed to give the precedence to the great principles of humanity in the law over its particular prescriptions when the two seemed to conflict. The organization of the sect, on the other hand, has no parallel within our knowledge. In view of the use of the name “camps” for the local communities, and the references to the “mustering” of the members, the “trumpets of the congregation,” and the like, it may be surmised that the organization of Israel in the wilderness suggested the plan, and that the Supervisors were meant to correspond to the chiefs of the tribes (for instance, Num. 1 10), each having authority over a separate camp.
The sect seems to have perpetuated itself for a considerable time, otherwise this book would hardly have been preserved. It may perhaps be conjectured that it survived long enough to be gathered, along with numerous younger sects, into the capacious bosom of Karaism, of which it was in various points a precursor. Such an hypothesis would explain how it came about that copies of the book were made in the tenth century and later, we should then suppose by Karaite scribes.[110]
Dr. Schechter has laid all students of Judaism under new obligations by the discovery and publication of these texts. They will join with their congratulations the hope that he may find yet other treasures among the accumulations of the Genizah.